Montoya pitted and restarted sixth — the first driver with four fresh tires —on the green-white-checkered restart. But he wound up finishing fourth while Kevin Harvick, who had restarted seventh, won the race.

“(I’m) pissed off,” Montoya said. “Everybody … did an amazing job. We had a great car. Same as last week, we had a great car. The pit crew redeemed themselves tonight.

“They did a great job all day, no mistakes. That is what we needed.”

What Montoya didn’t need was starting in the outside lane for that final restart. His Earnhardt Ganassi Racing teammate, Jamie McMurray, restarted second on old tires and finished 26th.

“We restarted on the outside,” Montoya said. “We were screwed. … When you restart on the outside and people have got really bad tires, everything packs up. And when you’re on the outside, where are you going to jump?”

Montoya’s main goal was not to wreck during the final two laps. He saw Harvick dart from beside him into the lead and knew the potential win had slipped away.

“When Harvick went by, I tried to get to the bottom and then the No. 22 (of Joey Logano) was there and I said, ‘We’ve just got to get a finish,’” Montoya said. “Remember, before this we had six really bad weeks.”

Montoya had not had a top-10 finish all season and his best finish in the last six weeks was 19th. Montoya had not finished better than he started in the past six races.

It was his first top-five finish since April 2011 at Martinsville.

“I’m happy,” crew chief Chris Heroy said. “You can’t control cautions. Harvick started on the inside of us and won the race with the same strategy.

“We did the right things.”

A former Indianapolis 500 and Formula One race winner, Montoya is in his seventh year of Cup racing with two career victories, both on road courses.

“You can’t make it that easy, man,” Heroy said. “It’s going to be special when it comes. It completes a resume for Juan that’s pretty much unparalleled and up with the greats.”